"Fast Five" has gone the struggle in the earth with an $83.6 million entrance to grab the No. 1 mark at the weekend box office, according to studio estimates Sunday.
Worldwide Pictures' fifth movie in "The Fast and the Furious" grant was by far this year's largest opening. Its take was more than two times the earlier best of $39.2 million for "Rio," the 20th Century Fox animated hit that slipped to No. 2 with $14.4 million.
The No. 1 movie the two previous weekends, "Rio" raised its total to $103.6 million.
"Fast Five" set a confirmation for greatest April debut ever, speeding past the $71 million haul of its predecessor, "Fast & Furious," two years ago.
The film reteams stars Vin Diesel and Paul Walker as outlaw lashing aces and adds Dwayne Johnson as a national negotiator on their tail. The accomplishment expands beyond the franchise's established racing scene into a wide crime romp.
"Summer began April 29," said Nikki Rocco, head of delivery for worldwide. "This was all about the right decisions we ended, from the idea to the task. How this was made, that it's not just a car-racing movie, but production it into an action-heist film. ... And the advertising that said, 'This is not the same. This is latest. You're going to love this, and it's going to open up an entire new earth.'"
The film gave Hollywood an enormous head-start on the summer season, which begins with next weekend's debut of the Paramount Pictures superhero saga "Thor."
Overall revenues totaled $155 million, up a whopping 52 percent from the same weekend previous year, when "A Nightmare on Elm Street" was No. 1 with $32.9 million, according to box-office tracker Hollywood.com.
It was the third-straight weekend that takes climbed, lifting Hollywood out of a expanded downturn that began last fall. Revenues for 2011 were successively 20.5 percent behind previous year's just three weeks before, but the bounce back since then has left Hollywood's trade down just 14.2 percent compared with 2010.
"What a dissimilarity three weeks can create," said Hollywood.com analyst Paul Dergarabedian. "We get so gloom-and-doom, and properly so, but look how rapidly we're turning this around. And we're on the cusp of the largest films-going season of the year."
"Fast Five" added $81.4 million abroad to bring its universal total to $165 million. "Thor" already has opened in many global markets, pulling in $93 million abroad ahead of its U.S. release.
Nationally, the weekend's other new wide releases tanked. Disney's teen fiction "Prom" debuted at No. 5 with only $5 million, while the Weinstein Co. animated sequel "Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil" opened at No. 6 with just $4.1 million
.Freestyle Releasing's horror comedy "Dylan Dog: Dead of Night," featuring "Superman Returns" star Brandon Routh, debuted far outside the top-10 with a paltry $885,000.
"Dylan Dog" played in narrower release of 875 theaters, averaging $1,011 a cinema, compared with $1,832 in 2,730 theaters for "Prom" and $1,653 in 2,505 cinemas for "Hoodwinked Too."
"Fast Five" played in 3,644 theaters, averaging a mammoth $22,950 a cinema.
Ten percent, or $8.3 million, of domestic revenues for "Fast Five" came from huge-screen IMAX theaters.
1. "Fast Five," $83.6 million.
2. "Rio," $14.4 million.
3. "Tyler Perry's Madea's Big Happy Family," $10.1 million.
4. "Water for Elephants," $9.1 million.
5. "Prom," $5 million.
6. "Hoodwinked Too! Hood vs. Evil," $4.1 million.
7. "Soul Surfer," $3.3 million.
8. "Insidious," $2.7 million.
9. "Hop," $2.6 million.
10. "Source Code," $2.5 million.
